Court documents state that on Wednesday, a mother and her boyfriend brought her five-week-old baby boy to San Jacinto Methodist Hospital in Baytown. The baby was unresponsive and medical staff attempted CPR, then pronounced the child dead. Doctors called police after they noticed numerous bruises on the baby's body.
The baby's mother told a deputy with the Harris County Sheriff's Office that her boyfriend, Sean Michael Wheeler, had agreed to watch the baby while she slept. She said Wheeler, who is not the baby's father, told her he was taking the boy for a ride in the car to help put him to sleep. When they returned a short time later, she said the baby wasn't breathing and was cold and limp, so she rushed him to the hospital.
Wheeler told authorities that while he was driving around with the baby, the child would alternately cry and then stop. He said he stopped to check on the baby once when he became quiet and noticed the child was breathing funny, so he returned home, got the baby's mother and they drove to the hospital.
Wheeler reportedly denied injuring the baby in any way, and claims he didn't shake him. While he told authorities he doesn't know how the baby got the bruises, Wheeler admits he was the only person with the infant when he stopped breathing.
Wheeler's attorney, Eric Dick, contacted ABC13 Eyewitness News and said, "He's completely innocent. He didn't do it. He didn't do anything wrong."
An autopsy showed the baby suffered bleeding on his brain and a blunt force injury to the back of the head. His death was ruled a homicide.
Wheeler, 23, has been charged with injury to a child. Bail has been set at $50,000.
